Professor Stephen Rollnick grew up in Cape Town, South Africa and completed a Masters training in research methods in Strathclyde University, Glasgow (1978) and a professional training in clinical psychology in Cardiff (1983). Since then he has lived and worked in this city, as a clinical psychologist in the National Health Service and more recently, as member of the Department of General Practice.

His early experience as a trainee nurse in a hospital addiction treatment setting led to an interest in constructive methods for helping people resolve difficult behaviour change problems. This has taken him through a close collaboration with Professor William R Miller on the subject of Motivational interviewing, a Doctoral thesis (1993) on counselling for excessive drinkers, to more recent work on consultations about lifestyle and medication use in healthcare practice. Through collaboration with Professor Chris Butler and Dr Paul Kinnersley he is now studying broader communication challenges like the antibiotic consultation, and the development and evaluation of methods for helping undergraduates and qualified practitioners change their communication and consulting behaviour. He has published a number of books and a large number of papers on these topics, and has trained practitioners in a wide range of settings and countries.